Beating the drum with Indians.com reporter Jordan Bastian

Happy New Year!

It was a quiet New Years celebration at the MLBastian household this year.

After hopping around various relatives’ homes for fun-filled Christmas gatherings, the missus and I wanted to ring in the New Year away from any chaos. Of course, the decision to stay home was made easier by the fact that we have both been fighting off colds.

Must be all those Christmas cookies we ate.

For us, 2011 is shaping up to be a pretty good year already. After living in Toronto for the past five years, we found our way back to the Midwest, to a house and town that just feels like home. With a young son now, the time has come to start introducing family traditions and that made these holidays a lot of fun.

On New Years Eve, I had MLBastian Jr. — 16 months old now — head out on our front porch to bang on a pot with a wooden spoon. He loved it and banging on pots and pans will be our New Years tradition from here on out. It’s what my family did when I was a kid. Our neighbors here will have to forgive us for doing so at 8 pm. Hayden had to get to bed.

As for the wife and I, we watched movies and tuned in to watch the ball drop in New York at midnight. We then walked outside to listen to celebrations around our neighborhood. Sure enough, we could here fireworks, noise makers and plenty of people yelling. We also heard some ticked off dogs barking away.

My point is this, we’re thrilled to be here in the Cleveland area now and looking forward to what the future will bring for us here.

And for all of you who have sent me notes via Twitter asking what the heck happened with my Spartans against Alabama… that was brutal. But, more to the point, what an awful New Years Day for the Big 10! I’ll be pulling for Ohio State so the conference can salvage the abysmal showing so far.

You won’t find that I get too worked up over bowl games, though. I personally don’t see the point of bowl games unless your school is in the national title game. Bring on some playoffs and maybe I’ll be interested. I haven’t watched a bowl game in years. Now, when there’s a Big 10 title game? That’s something I’ll care about.

MSU won a share of the Big 10 title this year. That’s good enough for me.

But, I digress…

You’re here for Indians content, but there isn’t much going on as of this moment. Cleveland has spent all of $1.3 million this winter on one Major League contract, preferring to use Minor League deals to bring in some competition for Spring Training. It’s a very young roster with a lot of growing to do, so the time to spend big is not now.

If the Tribe makes any more moves before spring, it might be to add another infielder or to bring in a starting pitcher. Cleveland might decide to head into spring with the infield options it has — third base and second base being the biggest question marks. On the mound, the Indians continue to be linked to veteran Bartolo Colon as a low risk, affordable option.

What would you like to see done with the roster before Opening Day?

–JB

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2 Comments

I like your article! I like tradition too, Castrovince had a tradition of making refrence to cult classic movies. i.e. Weekend at Bernies. My tradition growing up was opening one present at night time and then sleeping on the floor in my older sisters room. What will be our tradition now that MLBastian is our leader into the tribe info department?
…ROTATION…
What would I do with the team? I would sign Bartolo to a team friendly, incentive laden deal maybe 1 year 975 k with 1 mm incentive/option.
My rotation would be Fausto, Masterson, Talbot, Carrasco, Colon.. I would have David Huff, Tomlin and Gomez duke it out to try to take one of the spots in the rotation if they are more impressive then Talbot, so be it. I believe in the pitching coach in cleveland so if he believes in huff i do to. maybe we could have a rare 6 man rotation i dont know. I’d like to field the 5 best guys though of those 8. Pitching depth is a great problem, depends on who you talk to. I’d like to think we have depth at 4-5 starters. i expect 2011 to look like
Bartolo Colon
Fausto, Justin M, Mitch Talbot, Carlos Carrasco, David Huff
Lineup:>>> I would like to Lou Marson bat improve, If he brings a better bat with him, I would actually rank him as a very solid catcher, becuase of his defensive prowess. Slide Santana to 1B, LaPorta to left field.
C:Lou Marson 1B Carlos Santana 2B Jason Donald SS Asdrubal 3B Jayson Nix LF Matt LaPorta CF Grady RF Choo DH Travis Hafner

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